Originally Posted By: mman
Originally Posted By: leroycnbucks
Originally Posted By: N2TRKYS
I've hunted a lot of reclaimed mine land that had reverted to pines and fallow fields in IL that had very large deer. I didn't see any ag land around them. Soil alone doesn't do it without the genetics.



But wouldn't the genetics come from the rich soil that once or does now provide the ag fields? I really don't know but it seems it would.


Not exactly sure what you are asking/saying, but the deer are born with their genetics and that doesn't change with nutrition. Nutrition (lots of it determined by the soil) and age let them reach their full genetic potential.

I'm guessing that most southern deer never reach anywhere close to their genetic potential.


I'm asking doesn't the food source play a major part in their genetics or even future genetics? Just like what the OP was posting about. I've seen it myself growing up and hunting the black belt. Back in the late seventies early eighties when we had soybean fields of abundance they produced big healthy deer with mass antler growth. Now those same deer that once had those genetics no longer or at best occasionally produce mass antler growth due to the pine trees and CRP fields that now replace those ag fields like the QDM article was saying. Is this not possible? Or is it we don't let them grow old enough to really get that information? Maybe it could be both?

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